Lot 084
ABDULLAH ARIFF
b. Penang, 1904-1962
TWO CHINESE WOMEN
Undated
Signed in Jawi and ‘A.Ariff’ (lower right)
Watercolour on paper
28cm x 20.7cm
PROVENANCE
Private collection, Kelantan.
ESTIMATE RM 8,000 - 12,000
PRICE REALISED RM 31,900 |
In the recent trans-migratory history of China and Southeast Asia, it was common to see women working as coolies, in the tin mines and construction sites (like the Samsui Women who migrated from China to Singapore between 1920-1940).
The chronicle of everyday life of the common man and a subculture rarely seen today in the face of urbanisation, the artist portrays these two women going about their daily toil; one in the foreground with a lumbering gait, stoops from the weight of the load she is carrying, while the other, taller figure strides purposefully, walking stick in hand, with a child cradled in a cloth sling on her back. Both are barefooted and wear conical straw hats to shield themselves from the tropical heat. The style is more typical of the ‘anonymous’ Chinese illustrator artists of the 19th century who made simple line drawings and woodblock prints.
Born in Penang in 1904, Abdullah Ariff was acknowledged along with Yong Mun Sen as pioneers of watercolour painting in Malaysia. He was an art teacher at Anglo-Chinese school, Penang (presently known as Methodist Boy’s School) and member of the Penang Impressionists of expatriate artists in the 1920s. In 1954, he held a solo at North Carolina and the Mint Museum of Art in Charlotte, U.S.A. In 1955, he participated in the United Society of Artists group exhibition at the galleries of the Royal Society of British Artists, London. There, he was elected to join the Fellowship of the Royal Society of Art (F.R.S.A.) England. In 1995, he served as Penang City Councillor and had the rare distinction of having a road in Air Itam, Penang named after him.
REFERENCE
Abdullah Ariff - Father of Modern Art in Malaysia, Zakaria Ali, National Art Gallery, Kuala Lumpur, 2004.
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